Wellbores or boreholes may be drilled to, for example, locate and produce hydrocarbons. During a drilling operation, it may be desirable to evaluate and/or measure properties of encountered formations and formation fluids. In some cases, a drillstring is removed and a wireline tool deployed into the borehole to test, evaluate and/or sample the formations and/or formation fluid(s). In other cases, the drillstring may be provided with devices to test and/or sample the surrounding formations and/or formation fluid(s) without having to remove the drillstring from the borehole.
Some formation evaluation operations may include extracting one or more core samples from a sidewall of the borehole. Such core samples may be extracted using a coring assembly or tool that is part of a downhole tool, which may be conveyed via a wireline, drillstring, or in any other manner. Typically, multiple core samples are extracted from multiple locations along the borehole and stored in the downhole tool. The stored core samples may then be retrieved at the surface when the downhole tool is removed from the borehole and tested or otherwise evaluated to assess the locations corresponding to the core samples.